Augmented Reality: Project Glass News

Its been fairly quiet since April on the Google glasses front but at the recent Google I/O conference a veritable torrent of information came out.


We finally know that the interface with the device will not necessarily be speech but it infact houses a touchpad on the arm of the frame, allowing for silent control. Also being considered is a control mechanism using a ring on a finger, this combined with two sensors on the frame could allow for some very intuitive control in 3D space.

Also discussed were non-specifics such as RAM and processor, all they're commiting to right now is that it will be suitably powerful.

In addition to this details of an anti-theft mechanism came to light. The glasses will be sensitive to unexpected movements and using the gyroscope and accelerometer turn itself off until the rightful user unlocks it again.

Most exciting was the revelation of a $1,500 Explorer edition being made available for pre-order to US based Google developers (including Android developers) at the conference. Expected delivery of the prototype device is 2013.

The conference has also provided some excellent video clips which say much more than I can write in words so I've embedded those below for your viewing pleasure. One thing not discussed, which is surely the hot topic of wearable computing, was privacy and so it remains to be seen if such technology will even be considered legal in the EU on its release.